|
Weizmann
Institute of Science |
|
|
Contact Information: Tel : 972-8-9343997 Home
Page for Experimental nuclear Physics
Secretariat: |
Current Research Interests Nuclear structure research has been experiencing an impressive phase of development in recent years, based on ever-growing sophistication and refinements of experimental techniques and theoretical understanding. The main thrust is the quest to study the atomic nucleus for extreme (and ever increasing) values of the proton/neutron ratios, away from presently known nuclei. This endeavor motivates (and is triggered by) the use and construction worldwide of major, modern accelerators for radioactive beams. This impressive experimental and theoretical development of understanding and probing nuclear structure far from stability has also become very strongly interwoven with the field of nuclear astrophysics - using nuclear physics technique and data for understanding cosmological phenomena. Nuclear structure information is essential in understanding our Sun and the solar neutrinos and neutrino masses issues, as well as probing more distant and "exotic" sites that present scenarios for explosive synthesis of heavy elements (such as in x-ray bursts), and others. The nuclear structure and nuclear astrophysics subjects form
two separate, but strongly linked and interconnected, categories of fore-front research of our group.
We are conducting experiments in facilities both of the "in house" (the Van de Graaff accelerator
at the WI) nature as well as at major International facilities such as ISOLDE (CERN), GSI (Germany)
and GANIL (France). Of special interest is the newly-constructed 40 MeV, superconducting
SARAF accelerator at the Israeli SOREQ Research Centre and the associated R&D work towards production
of intense light radioactive beams such as 6He and 8Li that are of interest to nuclear astrophysics
as well as to neutrino physics.
|
